This is an email to my DH that I thought I'd share with you all about my findings...
Back to what I stated weeks ago, as long as our baby's heartrate is fine, has good fetal movement, and my fundus height is on track I will not be getting anymore ultrasounds to track fetal growth. I will be undergoing ultrasound at every appt. when they use doplar to count the heartrate. I would ask them to use a stethoscope (my right) but I do not think they could get an accurate heartbeat count. This is the lowest level of ultrasound so I'm not too worried about it. When I get checked in to L&D and they do EFM (external fetal monitoring) this is ultrasound. For the count we are up to 5 ultrasounds already. The groups all these links mention for having received large amounts of ultrasounds are 5. I'm guessing one more wouldn't do too much more harm. What's largely done is already done sadly for our little guy but on principal now that I know I won't submit him to this anymore. If you don't go to the links at least read the excerpts below that I have pulled from the various sites.
I read these and other research reports and have concluded the risk/benefit ratio is not worth it.
<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://educate-yourself.org/cn/2001/ultrasoundandbraindamage19dec01.shtml
">http://educate-yourself.org/cn...indamage19dec01.shtml
</a><a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.unhinderedliving.com/pultra.html
">http://www.unhinderedliving.com/pultra.html
</a><a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.mothering.com/articles/pregnancy_birth/birth_preparation/ultrasound-definition.html
">http://www.mothering.com/artic...sound-definition.html
</a><a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.midwiferytoday.com/articles/ultrasoundwagner.asp
">http://www.midwiferytoday.com/.../ultrasoundwagner.asp
</a>
Negatives: ...just a few that I've pulled from the above sites.
-retards fetal growth (funny this is IUGR the reason they want to do often scans on my baby)
-the speech-delayed children were about twice as likely to have been exposed to ultrasound than the matched controls.
-Sound is between 20 hertz and 20 kilohertz. Ultrasound waves travel between 2 and 4 megahertz and have been classified by the Bureau of Radiological Health as "radiation."
-unregulated levels - machines don't have to say what level their waves are - World Health Organization is urging something to be done about this. Doctors meanwhile preach that there is "no risk."
-Dr. Mendelsohn wrote, "Ultrasound produces at least two biological effects--heat and a process called 'cavitation' in which bubbles are created that expand and contract in response to sound waves. The first time I saw this cavitation process in action, a chiropractor turned on the therapeutic ultrasound machine in his office and placed a few drops of water on the part of the machine that was applied to the patient. I wish every reader...could have been with me to watch that water suddenly boil and bubble" (The People's Doctor, Vol.7, No. 11, p. 3).
THIS IS THE REASON CFERS GET A LOT OF ULTRASOUNDS:
One of the most common justifications given today for routine ultrasound scanning is to detect intrauterine growth retardation (IUGR). Many clinicians insist that ultrasound is the best method for the identification of this condition. In 1986, a professional review of 83 scientific articles on ultrasound showed that "for intrauterine growth retardation detection, ultrasound should be performed only in a high-risk population." In other words, the hands of an experienced midwife or doctor feeling a pregnant woman's abdomen are as accurate as the ultrasound machine for detecting IUGR. The same conclusion was reached by a study in Sweden comparing repeated measurement of the size of the uterus by a midwife with repeated ultrasonic measurements of the head size of the fetus in 581 pregnancies. The report concludes: "Measurements of uterus size are more effective than ultrasonic measurements for the antenatal diagnosis of intrauterine growth retardation."
If doctors continue to try to detect IUGR with ultrasound, the result will be high false-positive rates. Studies show that even under ideal conditions, such as do not exist in most settings, it is likely that over half of the time a positive IUGR screening test using ultrasound is returned, the test is false, and the pregnancy is in fact normal. The implications of this are great for producing anxiety in the woman and the likelihood of further unnecessary interventions.
There is another problem in screening for IUGR. One of the basic principles of screening is to screen only for conditions for which you can do something. At present, there is no treatment for IUGR, no way to slow up or stop the process of too-slow growth of the fetus and return it to normal. So it is hard to see how screening for IUGR could be expected to improve pregnancy outcome.
Back to what I stated weeks ago, as long as our baby's heartrate is fine, has good fetal movement, and my fundus height is on track I will not be getting anymore ultrasounds to track fetal growth. I will be undergoing ultrasound at every appt. when they use doplar to count the heartrate. I would ask them to use a stethoscope (my right) but I do not think they could get an accurate heartbeat count. This is the lowest level of ultrasound so I'm not too worried about it. When I get checked in to L&D and they do EFM (external fetal monitoring) this is ultrasound. For the count we are up to 5 ultrasounds already. The groups all these links mention for having received large amounts of ultrasounds are 5. I'm guessing one more wouldn't do too much more harm. What's largely done is already done sadly for our little guy but on principal now that I know I won't submit him to this anymore. If you don't go to the links at least read the excerpts below that I have pulled from the various sites.
I read these and other research reports and have concluded the risk/benefit ratio is not worth it.
<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://educate-yourself.org/cn/2001/ultrasoundandbraindamage19dec01.shtml
">http://educate-yourself.org/cn...indamage19dec01.shtml
</a><a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.unhinderedliving.com/pultra.html
">http://www.unhinderedliving.com/pultra.html
</a><a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.mothering.com/articles/pregnancy_birth/birth_preparation/ultrasound-definition.html
">http://www.mothering.com/artic...sound-definition.html
</a><a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.midwiferytoday.com/articles/ultrasoundwagner.asp
">http://www.midwiferytoday.com/.../ultrasoundwagner.asp
</a>
Negatives: ...just a few that I've pulled from the above sites.
-retards fetal growth (funny this is IUGR the reason they want to do often scans on my baby)
-the speech-delayed children were about twice as likely to have been exposed to ultrasound than the matched controls.
-Sound is between 20 hertz and 20 kilohertz. Ultrasound waves travel between 2 and 4 megahertz and have been classified by the Bureau of Radiological Health as "radiation."
-unregulated levels - machines don't have to say what level their waves are - World Health Organization is urging something to be done about this. Doctors meanwhile preach that there is "no risk."
-Dr. Mendelsohn wrote, "Ultrasound produces at least two biological effects--heat and a process called 'cavitation' in which bubbles are created that expand and contract in response to sound waves. The first time I saw this cavitation process in action, a chiropractor turned on the therapeutic ultrasound machine in his office and placed a few drops of water on the part of the machine that was applied to the patient. I wish every reader...could have been with me to watch that water suddenly boil and bubble" (The People's Doctor, Vol.7, No. 11, p. 3).
THIS IS THE REASON CFERS GET A LOT OF ULTRASOUNDS:
One of the most common justifications given today for routine ultrasound scanning is to detect intrauterine growth retardation (IUGR). Many clinicians insist that ultrasound is the best method for the identification of this condition. In 1986, a professional review of 83 scientific articles on ultrasound showed that "for intrauterine growth retardation detection, ultrasound should be performed only in a high-risk population." In other words, the hands of an experienced midwife or doctor feeling a pregnant woman's abdomen are as accurate as the ultrasound machine for detecting IUGR. The same conclusion was reached by a study in Sweden comparing repeated measurement of the size of the uterus by a midwife with repeated ultrasonic measurements of the head size of the fetus in 581 pregnancies. The report concludes: "Measurements of uterus size are more effective than ultrasonic measurements for the antenatal diagnosis of intrauterine growth retardation."
If doctors continue to try to detect IUGR with ultrasound, the result will be high false-positive rates. Studies show that even under ideal conditions, such as do not exist in most settings, it is likely that over half of the time a positive IUGR screening test using ultrasound is returned, the test is false, and the pregnancy is in fact normal. The implications of this are great for producing anxiety in the woman and the likelihood of further unnecessary interventions.
There is another problem in screening for IUGR. One of the basic principles of screening is to screen only for conditions for which you can do something. At present, there is no treatment for IUGR, no way to slow up or stop the process of too-slow growth of the fetus and return it to normal. So it is hard to see how screening for IUGR could be expected to improve pregnancy outcome.